Monday, July 8, 2013

Head of Chester Housing Authority speaks on Faces of Our Fathers

Last year, the Executive Director of the Chester Housing
Authority, Steven Fischer, has allowed a group of guys to gather with him to
talk about fatherhood.

‘Fathers are Talking – Join the Conversation’ is the group’s
name and once a month they meet in Steve’s office to share in very intimate,
moving, and emotional stories of each other’s experiences and opinions of what
it is to be a father.

The invitation to join the conversation is open to anyone
and there is always an emphasis to find ways to bring young fathers on board to
learn and share with them.

By design, theses gatherings have no formal agenda, no membership
requirements, nor any other trappings of structure. It’s just a group of black
fathers from Chester pouring their hearts out to each other. Steve just happens
to be white and no one holds it against him.

One of the fathers, Butch Slaughter, recently launched the
Odyssey Project Faces of Our Fathers Film Festival. I could only stop by on day
one for a short period, but Slaughter transformed the Booker T. Washington
community room in the Chatham Estates (formally Lamokin Village) into a
multi-room movie production and viewing space you had to see to believe.

One of the rooms was set up with cameras, lights, and a
green screen to produce movies. (I should have shot a CCity TV episode there).

If you don’t know Steven Fischer, here he is filmed in that
room talking about the film fest and Fathers are Talking.